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segunda-feira, 19 de julho de 2010

Novidades

Neutrinos are no longer just a curiosity of physics but a practical tool for astronomy

By Graciela B. Gelmini, Alexander Kusenko and Thomas J. Weiler

Key Concepts

Neutrinos will give astronomers a type of x-ray vision far better than actual x-rays. Being the most unreactive type of subatomic particle, they pass through intervening matter as though it were hardly there—revealing the cores of stars and other dramatic but otherwise hidden places in the cosmos.

Alas, the very property that makes neutrinos so useful means they tend to fly through detectors without registering. Only this year have instruments become sensitive enough to detect cosmic sources unequivocally.

Neutrinos come in multiple varieties and can metamorphose in midflight. This peculiar property provides additional information about their celestial origins.

Divers find what is thought to be the world's oldest drinkable champagne

'It was fantastic ... it had a very sweet taste ... very small bubbles'

STOCKHOLM — Now that's some vintage bubbly.

Divers have discovered what is thought to be the world's oldest drinkable champagne in a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea, one of the finders said Saturday. They tasted the one bottle they've brought up so far before they even got back to shore.

Diving instructor Christian Ekstrom said the bottles are believed to be from the 1780s and likely were part of a cargo destined for Russia. The nationality of the sunken ship has not yet been determined.

"We brought up the bottle to be able to establish how old the wreck was," he told The Associated Press. "We didn't know it would be champagne. We thought it was wine or something."

Ekstrom said the divers were overjoyed when they popped the cork on their boat after hauling the bubbly from a depth of 200 feet.

"It tasted fantastic. It was a very sweet champagne, with a tobacco taste and oak," Ekstrom said.

The divers discovered the shipwreck Tuesday near the Aland Islands, between Sweden and Finland. About 30 bottles are believed to be aboard the sunken vessel.

China has a Catalyst to Convert Shale Oil Directly into Transportation Fuel

In China, reserves of oil shales account for about 500,000 billion tons. It is distributed mainly in Fushun, Liaoning province, Huadian, Jilin province, and Maoming, Guangdong province... However, the shale oils produced from oil shales contain a considerable amount of heteroatomic compounds, especially unsaturated hydrocarbons, which may cause many troubles, such as, instability of fuel during its transportation or storage...Catalytic hydrotreating may be considered as the only convenient way to remove heteroatomic compounds from shale oil. However, many papers showed that severe process conditions were needed during catalytic hydrotreating of shale oils. The concentrations of heteroatomic compounds in shale oils could be reduced, but they were still too high to be used as a transportation fuel. Denitrogenation was more difficult than desulfurization for shale oils.